Dialogue and Universalism

Volume 24, Issue 2, 2014

Andrzej Gecow
Pages 63-80

Spontaneous Order, Edge of Chaos and Artificial Life as Missing Ideas in Understanding Life

The hypothesis “life on the edge of chaos” results from the stability of RBN, but living objects are not random; their structure and function are selected just for stability by Darwinian natural selection. The order of a crystal emerges spontaneously. The networks modeling living objects can be simultaneously ordered and chaotic on a similar level. They use chaotic parameters of RBNs. It is another edge of chaos. Definitions of artifacts are subjective and imprecise; problem should be described in other perspective. Basic properties of natural life (including the role of purpose) result from its spontaneity, which suggests a limit of using artificial life in investigations of life.